Resilient theory might play a vital role in building more resilient residences and designing greener and more organized environments in the T.R.N.C

European University of Lefke (EUL) Faculty of Architecture Academician Assist. Prof. Dr. Cemaliye Sunalp Gürçınar, Head of Graphic Design Department Assist. Prof. Dr. M. Selen Abbasoğlu Ermiyagil and Academician of Landscape Architecture Department Prof. Dr. Gülay Çetinkaya Çiftçioğlu presented their article titled “Resilience Approach: Sample of Lefke Region of Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus” at the 3rd European Conference on Science, Art and Culture (ECSAC’18 – North Cyprus).

European Conference on Science, Art and Culture which was held for the third time in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus was organized with the aim of providing an academic platform where the latest developments in science, art and culture, research studies and current issues are shared among different disciplines and scientists. Natural sciences, education, fine arts, design and planning, tourism and health were the main topics of the conference.

Gürçınar: The sustainability of urban green-fields must be supported

Assist. Prof. Dr. Cemaliye Sunalp Gürçınar who chaired the presentation and the related session gave information about the presentation. Gürçınar said that, built/established environments (open green-fields) provide direct (facilities for recreation, health, sense of space, and being able to watch the nature) and indirect (regulation of urban climate, soil formation and the water cycle support) benefits to the society and added that for sustainability of these benefits, urban green-fields must be supported. Gürçınar said that, “Factors such as extreme temperature, extreme humidity, water shortages and the effect of heat island on dry and semi-dry areas affect not only green areas but also residential and related built environment in urban areas”.

Gürçınar: “Resilient cities” approach has been initiated in many countries and resilient cities have been established

Gürçınar pointed out that, resilience has been integrated to the different disciplines (economy, architecture, landscape architecture) and started to be used widely and said that “”Resilient cities” approach has been initiated in many countries, resilient cities (Boston in America, Athens in Greece, Bristol in the  UK) have been established and the studies are still proceeding”. Gürçınar underlined that, resilient theory might play a vital role in building more durable residences and designing greener and more organized environments in the T.R.N.C and added that, in this context the aim of their study is to evaluate buildings and gardens of Sample of Lefke Region of T.R.N.C with taking three distorting effects (extreme drought and humidity, and change in land use) into consideration.

Gürçınar said that, in this context, resilience of 50 buildings and gardens which possess traditional architectural features were evaluated with several indicators and added that these indicators which were used to evaluated the resilience of buildings and gardens were determined with a literature review. Gürçınar stated that, a survey form which included the determined indicators was prepared and added that field studies were carried out in Lefke region between February-June 2016. Pointing out that data on indicators for the resilience of residences and home gardens were evaluated between 1-5 likert scale, Gürçınar said that, according to this evaluation levels were as follows; 1: Very Low Resilience, 2: Low Resilience, 3: Medium resilience, 4: High Resilience and 5: Very high resilience.

Gürçınar: According to the results of the study, three main indicators can be used to correlate the resilience of the residences and gardens.

Gürçınar said that, “According to the data analysis, the resilience of the residences located in the Lefke region in the presence of distorting effects is 2.22 which is low and the resilience of the gardens located in the Lefke region in the presence of distorting effects is 2.49 which is low”. Gürçınar pointed out that, according to the results of the study, three main indicators can be used to correlate the resilience of the residences (build environment) and (green/live system) gardens and listed these three indicators as; diversity (eg, building material used in residential buildings and variety of plant species in the garden), traditional knowledge (eg information on the construction of traditional dwellings, traditional knowledge of the use and recognition of plants grown in the garden) and connectivity (degree of sharing of traditional knowledge about building local houses and the degree of connection of house gardens to other green areas in the vicinity).

Gürçınar said that, “As a result, promoting resilient cities approach in the T.R.N.C, designing livable cities and integration of “resilience theory” into national and regional planning strategies to improve the quality of life of urban people are musts”.